Samson Schames: Fragments of Exile

Samson Schames came from a long-established Jewish family in Frankfurt. With the support of his uncle, renowned gallery owner Ludwig Schames, he made his way into the 1920s art scene and began his training as a painter, graphic artist, and stage designer. Schames’s designs, drawings, and oil paintings from the period up to 1933 testify to this artist’s deep connection to Frankfurt and its landscapes.

After the National Socialists came to power, Schames emigrated to London in 1939, where he began creating innovative mosaics from shards of glass, porcelain, and crockery—the material evidence of the bombings. The new cabinet exhibition in the “Art in Exile" room focuses on these large-scale works of art that emerged from the devastation. The presentation focuses on the three important phases of the artist’s life and relates his time in Frankfurt and artistic beginnings to the work he made in British exile and finally to his new home, New York.